A Century Of Want
by soulless
Summary: finished
1. in the end

summary: you wouldnt believe me if i told you now, what i can tell you is i will work hard this becaurse i want plent of reviews, buffy will come back and it wont take me that long to write this, and as for this chapter i want to give people a taste and tell you that it only introduces spike as how i think he would be by himself for a hundred years  
  
disclaimer: ill see you in court joss  
  
i would like to know where my writing goes thanks  
  
  
  
A CENTURY OF WANT  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
He slowly walked the streets he had so long defended, watching and waiting for little more than a century, these narrow pathways and side streets all looked different from a different time, they where overgrown with weeds, the streets cracked from the heat of the California sun.  
  
It all looked so strange every time he walked down them, every time he left the house he expected them to half heartedly to be the same, to look the same, but they never did. They had aged, he had aged and so had this cursed town.  
  
No one lived here anymore, no one had lived here for more than a century and in that century he had felt nothing except loneliness and love, now a pathetic love, a love for a girl who had died more than a hundred years ago and had never returned his affection.  
  
His love now ran deep, he had nothing else, nothing but regret, love and a promise, the same promise that kept him here in Sunnydale defending the world from the other big bad's from opening the gateway to hell itself.  
  
In all his years here he must have saved the world a countless amount of times, all of it for her, and for himself, it was that promise that kept him what he was, although it was a hazy definition what he was, his memory, his promise, regret and love gave him clarity and helped him destroy and burn anything and everything that entered this town.  
  
He was its soul inhabitant now, there was no-one left, nothing but him and a ghost town that was riddled with action a hundred years back, and to every turn he took, at every building he looked at memories half as old as himself flooded back, walls no longer looked decayed, dust and sand from the desert disappeared as did all the corpses of various demons that littered the streets, he was a phantom in his own mind, he would look at a room and not see it for what it was now, a shallow decayed and deprived hollow thing but what it was then, when he had things good when there was light in his life. He looked on as events and people long dead took centre stage in his mind, and things unravelled themselves, mistakes, joys and grief all played there part.  
  
He was no longer what he was, but he was sure he was less, a century ago people had called him spike, William the bloody, now no one called him anything.  
  
He was as old as his grandsire was when he had come to this god forsaken place, and he wondered if he felt the same as he did now when he had come, probably not, there was hope in his sires world there was none in his, he was going to hell he new it and he wouldn't delude himself into thinking that there was something better for the likes of himself, and so when the day or night finally comes he would never embrace it, he would fight and claw his way for life no matter how empty he was, he still allowed himself to carry out the one thing that he still and most probably would ever give a shit about, his promise.  
  
Over the years, all those years which seemed like a millennium, all of the scum had crawled out of the wood work, vampires like himself, demons, devils and cults all wanting to open the hell mouth, and each time he had been there, he had been there for her, as he should have been there a century ago.  
  
That night had tortured him, he lived it over and over again, every night in his dreams, how he had protected her sister, how he had defeated that demon and prevented the girl from being cut and saved the day and prevented his love from taking a swan dive from two hundred and fifty feet, and that is how he had saved the world again and again, she would have sacrificed her own life again and again and so would he, her life was worth so much more and so in his mind it was she who stood by him spurring him on to do what was right, just as she did, but it wasn't for her, it was for his promise to her.  
  
But reality came crashing every night, he woke up and he was in the exact same place he had been for a century, living with the consequences of what really had happened that night. He couldn't stop Dawn from being cut, he couldn't prevent that bastard from throwing him of that tower and yet he still had a nagging arduous feeling inside telling himself that he could have stopped her from jumping.  
  
Years had passed and all those faces where long gone, Xander, Giles, Anya, Willow and precious Dawn, all where gone, six feet under, but he was still here. He was the only one left who new of the long battles with the forces of darkness on the hell mouth, even the vampires he once new where gone even Drucila. Angel had even regained his humanity and had aged and died. Out of everyone he was the last to go, and he suspected that he still had a while yet, a very long while.  
  
He had defended this town for a very long time, and he had his scars, a while back his face had been slashed and scared leaving him marked forever, his body had wounds from copious amounts of torture and abuse, yet he still dressed the same with the same long leather jacket he took from the second slayer he had killed, he didn't know why it just felt right, no one had come near him in so long he had no idea of the outside world.  
  
Occasionally though, some came. Come to wake him up from his nightmare as they saw it, some even came to worship him as some sort of vampire messiah, vampires, some young vampires came and told him that they admired him telling him that they thought he was the perfect embodiment of what a vampire should be, recluse, not willing to trust others, and have there own territory that they would defend to the death. These demons that admired him where executed on the spot, this behaviour and willingness to be alone went on for so long, that neither man nor beast dare enter the town, its inhabitant they thought was crazy, insane and definitely not someone to be toiled with or associated.  
  
Only a few new what made him do what he did, some of them thought they could exploit his love, some even brought women who looked almost exactly like buffy, but they weren't, they may have been young and innocent and everything inside him begged to be with them but they weren't Buffy no one was her, no one. Soon the only people who came where the fanatics, the people or demons who's own religion demanded them to open the mouth of hell, and these where the only people our William ever dealt with, for another very long time.  
  
And so he talked to no one and dealt with his pain that was so, ever so bitter sweet.  
  
Demons littered the streets, he had killed hundreds and no longer could be bothered to bury them and so he left them to rot in the streets.  
  
And that is how life had been for spike for a hundred years after Buffy's friends and her sister had left sunnydale, not long after them everyone on Sunnydale had left, either that or they just where swallowed up by the world. And after the last people where gone, no one came into sunnydale and left alive.  
  
He had worked with Buffy's friends all summer, the summer after her passing, they had a robot that looked exactly like they girl his heart died again and again for, he even felt bad looking at the poor thing, the thing that reminded him so much of his one chance for true happiness.  
  
Then the armies of hell had found out, he wasn't exactly sure how but they had, and they came in there gangs, and groups and cults. First it was a motor cycle gang full of world class scum, they had expected to be able to be able to defend the town and the people, but without the slayer it was hopeless they had no way to defend themselves, and it was there, at that moment in time that he knew what his empty fate would be.  
  
He had told Dawn to go and live with Giles in England, he knew watcher boy would look after her like she was his daughter, and with no hell mouth she didn't need much protecting, the others did the same, they all went there separate ways except Willow and Tara who moved to Los Angeles to help angel.  
  
He had wondered why he had not heard from any of them, but he knew they had there own lives, and he had his fate, to deal with the slime of civilisation and to dream of a girl, one beautiful and wonder us girl and wonder for all eternity, what…what could have been 


	2. three little pigs

Chapter 2  
  
Spike wandered the length of Sunnydale every night looking for anything with enough Gaul to try and take him on, he rarely expected to find anyone and never human. About fifty years ago humans came, they belonged to some sort of demon cult, the demon had told them that the vampire that guarded Sunnydale could not harm them because they where his children, in reality the demon new of spikes chip. When they came Spike was bewildered he did not know what to do, if he harmed them his chip would activate and he would be cowering before those imbeciles, but he new that if they where to open the gateway to hell and release the devils into this dimension that his promise to buffy would be broken and Dawn, her friends the Scooby's and there descendants and family would suffer eternal torment, and that is something which he would never allow to happen, he would burn in hell to keep his word.  
  
At first he had tried to scare the humans with his vampire visage, some where frightened but none ran, believing themselves above reproach. And in the end he had nothing left to do but attack them just as he attacked the demons, knowing his chip would activate he did so anyway.  
  
But the chip did not activate and had saved the day again, in that first instance of knowing that his chip was no longer active he grabbed a young girl and pinned her up against the wall and nuzzled her neck savouring her warmth and scent which had so long been denied to him, the girl was crying and begging him to be freed but he could not hear her or even feel her wriggling, trying to escape with every ounce of life, he was caught in her intoxication that he had once taken for granted.  
  
As he was about to bite into the young sweet and tender flesh, images ran through his mind, images of the Scooby's and Dawn, this girl looked a lot like Dawn and could not have been much older than her the last time he had seen her, and finally there was one image that stuck in his mind, an image he could not get rid of no matter how hard he tried, the image of Buffy looking at him curious as to what he thought he was doing, as he had the girl pinned to the wall, his mind swayed one way and then the other about what he should do, and the image grew more intense and more innocent and he felt as though he could feel Buffy's presence as though she was standing next to him, something which made him feel ashamed as to what he was about to do.  
  
He let the girl go.  
  
His mind always came up with things unexpected like that, as he patrolled Sunnydale and its many graveyards and back streets, all of them had a story to tell, himself the only one who could tell it.  
  
As he walked down one of the main streets he could hear a one of the public phones start to ring, he was startled by this considering there was no electricity in the town any more, he ran towards the phone, its ringing getting louder and louder, he picked it up "he..hello", right then and there is mind blasted itself with the deafening noise of a thousand phones ringing all at once, even the phone he had just answered started to ring again, the sound was over whelming "STOP IT, STOP IT" he screamed and shouted over and over tossing and turning on the floor, he held both hands to his ears "WHAT DO YOU WANT…. URGH" he pressed tighter and tighter on his head, using his vampire strength to try and block out the noise, which was now screeching rather than ringing.  
  
He started to press so hard on his head that his ears started to bleed, and just when he couldn't squeeze any harder, just when he thought the noise was going to blow his head up it stopped, and then silence, nothing. He lay there on the floor looking up at the sky, wondering what had just happened, he couldn't remember, and he stared at his hands which now had blood on them, and his head felt as though it had been in a vice.  
  
He got up off the floor and simply carried on with his patrol, which was nearly over for the night, then he would go back to the house, and see Gertrude, Witherspoon and Heather.  
  
The sun was coming up soon, and he didn't want to see its dawn, it only made him sad to see the orange and purple colours in the sky, reminding him that this was another thing that he would never be able to embrace. The sky in the day reminded him of her, her true colours, her blond hair, her green eyes and her orange tan, and the day was warm, just like she was warm. Thinking about the day only drove him to despair, something which he had to much of lately, he sometimes chuckled to himself of what he would have made of himself a hundred years ago, if that spike could see himself now, he wondered what he would have done if he had known what was going to happen.  
  
Spike walked down the street the house belonged to, he called it the house, it was never his home, it was Buffy's home, he was just staying there, it was one of the last places the demons thought they would find a psychotic love sick vampire, in suburbia.  
  
He walked down the road, no cars or vehicles had used the roads in decades, on both sides the houses where no different to what had happened to the rest of the small city, walls where cracked from the various earth quakes southern California got, paint from the houses had curled and crumpled from the hot sun and termites had riddled the wood making it unsafe for quite a while now, the grass on the lawns in front of the houses was at least a meter high, and any little trees people had where huge now, there roots causing subsidence in the neighbouring houses making a few lob sided, he mused at the roots cracking through the pavement and the road, noticing that with time and pressure any thing was possible.  
  
He new all this of by heart, he tried living in some other houses for a little change, but none of them felt right, he never felt comfortable or at rest in them. He walked down this street with his head held down looking at the floor, he new his route, he had taken it for very long time.  
  
Finally he had walked far enough, he stopped dead in his tracks looked up and seen the house that lay before him, it was here that most of his fondest memories came to mind, he remembered the first time he was here bargaining for Drucillas life and talking to Buffy's mother, she was a sweet women, she always had marshmallows for him.  
  
He walked up the porch steps that creaked to his step, being rotten wood it would probably fall through soon, the house almost looked haunted, if people back in the day could see it now he thought. He opened the door simply by pushing it, it had been kicked open by a demon a while back who had figured on where he lived, and he simply couldn't replace the broken lock, he walked into the front room which contained a large metal drum connected to plastic wires and glass vials with a small flame underneath a larger glass container which held copious amounts of moonshine, he would try and drink himself to death in the lighter hours of the day, this was how he usually got to sleep, him and his stile which created his precious moonshine made from potatoes and blood.  
  
Speaking of blood, it was time to meet Spikes donors.  
  
He collected the animal feed from outside, coupled with a few chopped up apples and pears, from the trees outside, and made his way to the basement, there his three friends lived, his three pot belly pigs, "heads up kiddies, daddies home, and I've got treats" he walked down the stairs of the basement with a smile as the three pigs rushed towards him with ears flopping and loud grunts of appreciation where dealt spikes way.  
  
One pig made its way to his side and Spike smiled and stroked its head "there, there Gertrude I haven't forgotten you, I've got treats for you too", he marched towards their large troth and pored the contents of the feed bag into the troth, the three pigs rushed over and threw there heads into the troth eating greedily, "bloody pigs" he said with a smile on his face.  
  
He stoked all three of them as they fed on what he had collected from the garden, "there's a boy Witherspoon".  
  
He knelt down beside Witherspoon and pulled a glass bottle from the corner beside the troth, and revealed a small scalpel from the inside of his jacket, he put the bottle next to soft skin, and with the scalpel proceeded to cut the pig "there, there Witherspoon, all be over soon" the pig gave of a small squeal of pain "sshh, boy nearly done", the bottle was filling up nicely with the thick pigs blood, he had learned a while ago how to get the blood to almost taste like human blood, sweet and thick.  
  
The bottle had filled to the top, and Witherspoon had really hadn't taken much notice, spike did this to them nearly every night, and they had become accustomed, well after all he was the one who brought the treats.  
  
He had taken enough, at least a pint and since he hadn't seen much action in quite a while he didn't need that much, he put the bottle down on the floor and pressed Witherspoon's wound putting pressure on it, and allowing the blood to dry before he put a plaster on the cut "there now that wasn't that bad was it boy".  
  
The where left to finish there meal and stood up walking over towards the old stairs, he jumped up the stairs two at a time with his bottle of blood in hand.  
  
He emerged and seen that it was dawn outside, he gave a slight sigh and walked over towards his stile, its metal drum becoming rusty, he turned the nozzle to one of the large pieces of plastic tube releasing the clear alcohol into a large jar, he put up to a pint of clear wood stripper into the jar and closed the nozzle, he then put his blood from Witherspoon into the jar making a unhealthy pink colour looking liquid.  
  
He moved into the living room and threw himself down on the sofa which was now worn and had a deep impression where he had relaxed so many times before.  
  
He sat back and took a long swig of the jar that must have been around seventy percent proof, which he just drank like water, he looked around the room, it was a dump, he was sure it was damp cause of the wallpaper peeling from the walls, everything was discoloured and large marks had appeared on the walls, plaster had fallen down in places, revealing the hollow walls, mice ran in and out of the house, but then at least they weren't rats and hay everyone needs a place to stay, even the likes of spike.  
  
He reached forward towards the coffee table and there lay his sketches and photos of buffy and the Scooby's, sometimes he wondered why none of them had come back when the demons had left realising both that there was nothing left to eat and king spike didn't want them there, he thought about what they most probably had done with there lives, he thought of Xander and Anya married with rugrats living a long and healthy life, he only knew of Willow and Tara going to Angel because that is where they said they would most probably be needed, and he knew little Dawn had gone to England, he had made sure she was to grow up there with Giles, he was there when she boarded the plane, she looked back at him with curious and sad eyes, she probably thought about what he was going to do all alone in Sunnydale.  
  
Wondering about what happened to nibblet always made him go deep into thought mode, he new that Giles would have provided the best of everything for her, the very best education, he giggled to the thought of Dawn with an English accent and going to Oxford. Or maybe she just got married to some handsome guy and had a bunch of kids, anyway he knew that she would have been surrounded by loved ones when she died, probably great grand children, that thought gave him rest, but he always could never figure on why they had never come back, or at the very least why hadn't the council sent another slayer.  
  
Consumed thoughts all ran as to this question, maybe they thought there was no need, there where no humans to protect anymore and spike was there to protect the hell mouth.  
  
He looked at each of the pictures of all of them, the photos had become crumpled and brown, he took another swig on the large jar, a tier came to his eye when he fixed his eyes on Buffy's picture, he knew what her fate had been. 


	3. last thoughts of temptation

CHAPTER THREE  
  
When spike awoke the next morning he had a crashing migraine, he was sure the pain was there in his sleep causing him to never dream, he sat back on the sofa, he hadn't slept up stairs for a while, he didn't want to go where she had looked so peaceful and most beautiful, where his nights were full of hate and violence.  
  
His thoughts wandered as he sat and took a breathe, putting his head between his legs, holding his head  
  
He wanted to loose it all, his unlife his sanity, none of it made any difference any more, nothing was important, he would gladly step outside into the morning sun he'd welcome the brief peaceful seconds before he awoke in hell. God he wanted desperately to die, just to get away from the continuing cycle that was his nightmare, the only thing that stopped him, what was it…. he thought…. sometimes he forgot the promise he had made then the only thing stopping him from laughing and being free was a nagging feeling, eating up his insides to remember, and when he did he'd curse himself for forgetting, but that nagging feeling that eats away in the pit of his stomach was getting weaker every time he forgot and soon he wouldn't feel anything except guilt and shame at what he was and what he had done and then, then bliss and nothing would matter not even his promise or that he never received affection from his beloved.  
  
He just wanted peace just like every other dead man, he couldn't stand the fact that all faces from his memory past, and old pictures where all beginning to resemble her face.  
  
He thought he was going mad, soon he thought he'd be an animal, or maybe he would just give in and leave, he could anytime, just leave, walk out the door and never return, it would be easy, just to eat off a human being, to give in and pour all that frustration and descent of a hundred years into the warm sweet neck of some beautiful young thing, it would be glorious.  
  
Spike closed his eyes and imagined for a moment himself doing this, and there was no one in the world to stop him now, when he came to Sunnydale he was an extremely hard and resourceful vampire who could have taken on any one or anything, he even came half and half with the greatest slayer of all time. And now, now my god it would be wonderers to see how he measured up to everything else, even the slayer of today wouldn't be able to match him now and demons would except him again because of how terrible and devastating he would be, and vampires, vampires would worship him, he would be a god to them, vampires came decades before asking him if he was indestructible, if he had found the secret to prevent a stake to do its damage, or if he had found the legendary ring of Amara, they where all young vampires no old masters left he'd be the oldest and the strongest, he could hold dominion.  
  
But he couldn't do any of this his heart wouldn't allow him, he couldn't bring himself to even leave Sunnydale, what would have been the point to his past sacrifice, it should have all been unthinkable, but he was still a demon, even if he only had thoughts of vice he was still a demon.  
  
But even a demon was a victim to love, and his well that's all that kept him from doing what he did, it kept him from bathing in the blood of the world, to defend Sunnydale and stay put, and he would stay put, not to prove his point to a girl that was not only dead a hundred years and who hated him, who told him he was revolting and disgusting rather than tell him she cared just a little, he did it because he loved her and he if he loved her he had to love Joyce and Dawn and all of the people they cared about and knew not to mention there descendants.  
  
That's why he stayed to prevent harm and if Buffy was looking down on him from time to time, she could perhaps sympathise a little and not look at him as a pathetic monstrosity, that he had evolved.  
  
But he new she did look down on him, this was all a precursor to hell, sort of a purgatory especially made up for him, to truly live out his love, until there was no more love he could give, and then after perhaps millenniums he would finally go to hell and the devil would say to him 'told you so' and he would cry out while being consumed for all the rights he had done, he would cry out in terror as he would be burnt and tortured by all those he killed, human and demon alike.  
  
But he would rather have this fate dealt to him right now rather than to go back now, he'd come to far.  
  
And so he grabbed an axe of the floor "see you tonight, boys and girls" and walked out the door for another night of patrol. 


	4. a word in your ear

CHAPTER FOUR  
  
As he walked down the centre of one of the many roads, axe held down his side, he repeated movements he had made for decades.  
  
It was night and the eternal stars where out to watch him perform his nightly ritual, his blood shot eyes darted back and forth ever vigilant for any sign of danger, despite there being none for some time, occasionally though, he would look up at the stars.  
  
He started to look at the stars in a different light, he wondered from time to time if these stars where pin holes in the curtain of night, if they where gateways for the souls in heaven to look down on the earth and watch there loved ones, he remembered how drucilla had looked at the stars, she would ponder and wonder at them giving them names as if they where people or conscious or someone who could understand her insanity, and now it was his turn to look at the stars, he thought maybe he was insane like dru, but when does an insane person know there insane, don't insane people think there sane and don't sane people think them selves sane and not insane, he wasn't sure what frame of mind he had but sane people know themselves sane enough to be able to judge sane people from insane and now, he wasn't sure he could make that distinction anymore.  
  
He just walked his long walk, sane or insane he did what he did and in his deepest heart he supposed it was out of love. He would keep doing what he now does forever.  
  
He turned onto main street, it was here that most of the demon corpses lay, a lot of sand blew in this way, main street was also the street that looked most defeated, walking down this street was almost like walking into his future, soon all of sunnydale would look like this, the street looked like Dante's inferno had passed through just to party.  
  
As he walked the long road that would eventually lead to the cemetery he saw a figure of a man standing there in the middle of the street exactly opposite himself, spike was taken a little affront by this and he stopped walking, a little startled, he stood opposite for a time taking in that someone was here, he new what he was going to do that much was certain, he was just taking in that not for some years had he seen another person and now here a person was and his first intentions towards who or what ever it was, was butchery and carnage, it wasn't his natural desire that called this feeling forth, he was more like a machine now, see someone kill it.  
  
This person looked male but in these things you could never tell, demon, human, whatever. Anyway it was dressed familiar yet strange, it wore a hat that looked like the hats gangsters wore in the 1930's and it was dressed in clothes that where reminiscing of the last century, cloths that where of the same period as spikes.  
  
Spike sized the figure up before him, he looked human `great a history buff, who maybe thinks I cant harm him' he thought.  
  
A shot of excitement ran through him as he walked towards the figure, he made clear to the figure that he had an axe in his hand, spike walked tenderly taking his time walking towards the figure "you should not have come here, I told all of you to stay away, you don't belong here, its not your place, its not your time, your not meant to be hear, I thought you all knew that now, no one comes here not anymore, not human not demon, GO AWAY NOW" the last three words spike bellowed had a deep meaning, he wanted to be left alone, he didn't want this person here, he was used to himself and his three friends, why this person was here didn't interest spike in the slightest it was all the same any way, they came to open the hell mouth, destroy the world etc, etc.  
  
The figure didn't move, spike didn't care, in moments if this guy didn't budge he was going to be flayed in to several different parts.  
  
Spike was now walking faster, if he would have had a beating heart it would be going a thousand miles per hour, adrenaline would be rushing up and down his spine, his lungs would beg to be fed oxygen, but he didn't have a beating heart, so all he could feel was nothingness and a void, this figure would be in a long list of corpses soon enough.  
  
He swung his axe around, and just as he was about to enter swinging distance the figure spoke "you don't have much of English accent anymore"  
  
Spike stopped and his vampire visage became apparent, he lifted his nose to the wind and breathed in the scent of the thing that stood before him "hm...demon, although unfamiliar, I've never smelt anything like you...this is your last chance, I'm sure you know who I am so I'm telling you now to leave, believe it or not this is the longest conversation I've had in a very long time, and that's why I haven't cleaved you in half right now, but make no mistake if you stay here I will end you existence"  
  
"my name is whistler, I know your not going to be much on the old talk front, and to tell you the truth I respect your decision to do what it is you do, even if you cant keep it up forever" spike looked at him unfazed "another thing I don't want to be here" spike raised his axe.  
  
"you where warned, I told you to leave, you wouldn't listen. I warned you, I told everyone not to come here, this is my home, its my territory, you leave or die..your stayin so you die"  
  
"whoa there, please" spike was about to swing "ITS ABOUT BUFFY MAN"  
  
Spike swung the axe and just as about the axe was about to touch whistlers neck, he swung the axe away and grabbed a whole of whistler with both hands "I'm so hungry, that I could eat demon blood you know, do you have any idea how bad demon blood tastes to a vampire...let me tell you that any vampire who drains a demon is considered insane, that's how bad it tastes and right now I could really go for some demon blood"  
  
He focused in on whistlers eyes, he wasn't going to drain whistler but he wanted this person to be frightened just in case he decided to let him go.  
  
"sh...she's comin back" 


	5. my darling luv

g 


	6. PLEASE READ FIRST

I have been gowing over my brothers things recently, due to his suidide in june.  
  
im sorry, this story will never be finished, i would like to mention that my brother probably wrote this when he was intoxicated due to his alcoholism and that it REALLY had no mark upon his works in literature at university, writing was his life. 


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